Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-06-12-Speech-1-108"
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"en.20060612.18.1-108"2
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".
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, just as we cannot live without air, we cannot live without water either. Water is literally a very profound substance, and we must take care lest we perish in its depths. I was reminded of this by the discussion about the common position on the groundwater directive over the past few days.
The report from the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety contains 43 amendments as a recommendation for second reading in Parliament. It was adopted by 50 votes to none with one abstention. Only four additional amendments have been submitted. I take this convincing vote as an unequivocal mandate for negotiations between Parliament and the Council. I hope that today’s debate will help to confirm this vote, so that the European Parliament can enter into the conciliation procedure with a strong platform and a clear mandate. For this reason, as your rapporteur, I propose that we vote on a package. I am opposed to all the amendments that were tabled with 37 signatures. They do not reflect the views of my own group.
Sadly, the Council has not proved flexible enough to pave the way for an agreement with Parliament at this second reading. The conciliation procedure will now give us the opportunity to make further improvements to the common position that has been set before us. Improvements are desperately needed in some areas. The wording of the legal provisions must be formulated more precisely wherever it is still vague and open to interpretation. In addition, concepts referred to in the text must be defined. Inherent geogenically determined levels of pollutants must be taken into account when the status of groundwater is assessed. This will create the necessary flexibility to allow for differing circumstances in the Member States. The deterioration of groundwater caused by new pollutant discharges must be prevented by means of clear criteria for the reversal of adverse trends. The national threshold values must be set on the basis of toxicological and ecotoxicological criteria. These are the only criteria we have, and a study conducted by the European Commission has confirmed that this approach is actually feasible. A revision clause must be inserted in order to ensure that the effectiveness of the directive can be verified and that its provisions can be improved if need be.
It is particularly important to me as your rapporteur that greater emphasis should be placed on preventive protection of groundwater. We have been campaigning for this for many years here, for prevention is better than cure. This truth is nowhere more evident than in respect of groundwater. It can take years and even decades before discharged pollutants are identifiable in groundwater after seeping through the soil. It takes just as long before enacted measures or the self-purifying properties of groundwater can eliminate damage once it has occurred. If the purification of groundwater is at all possible, it is an enormously expensive process, a point that is rightly emphasised by many of my honourable colleagues, especially those from the United Kingdom.
In Austria and in my own country of Germany, between 80 and 100% of drinking water is obtained from groundwater. As we have just read, this is even the case in parts of Britain. This is precisely the reason why we must ensure that our groundwater which is still pure remains so for future generations. The groundwater ecosystem as such must be protected.
Many telephone calls from fellow Members and numerous opinions from associations, as well as some motions for separate votes, all testify to a high degree of uncertainty. Given the difficult and highly technical subject matter and the scope of the regulatory provisions of the Water Framework Directive, this is hardly surprising really. The fact remains, however, that we need not entirely reinvent the wheel. This groundwater directive is a daughter to the Water Framework Directive of 2000, which already regulates many pertinent matters. Nevertheless, we must make its message clear and unequivocal. For this reason I eagerly await the message you will convey, Commissioner Dimas, on the comment about the Nitrates Directive and the reference to the latter. These provisions are extremely important to the European farmers who are affected by them.
‘Water instead of diamonds’ was the heading of an article that appeared last week in the financial section of a major daily newspaper in Germany. Slowly but surely, clean water is becoming a scarce and valuable commodity, as rare as diamonds. The demand for clean water will continue to rise in the coming decades. The last hundred years have already seen
consumption increase twice as fast as the population and as the real value of economic output. Investments in water-management enterprises are recommended. Today and in tomorrow’s vote we should pave the way for our groundwater to remain an elixir of life and a precious diamond for future generations."@en1
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